In disciplines such as literature, music, and the visual arts, the material to be dealt with can be divided into two major groups: the works themselves, poems, novels, scores, recordings, and so on (primary sources); and works of interpretation and criticism (secondary sources).

In the arts, organization by subject content is seldom seen as the most useful means of arranging resources; arrangement by language, form, period, or genre (or rather, combinations of these) provides an easily understandable and non-contentious method, and is preferred at least for initial organization. It also reflects the way in which literature, for example, is commonly studied.

Although LCSH is not used to provide a systematic arrangement, this focus on attributes of language, form, period and genre is reflected in many of the headings for the creative arts:

A great number of the headings for literature reflect this basic preoccupation with the three major facets of language, period and form, but LCSH has a considerable advantage for retrieval over its associated classification scheme (and indeed most other knowledge organization schemes in their treatment of literature). LCSH allows the cataloguer to express an unusually large range of attributes of literature, including very precise themes and topics, as well as literature specified by all sorts of social and cultural characteristics. It can be very erratic in coverage and, as usual, very unpredictable in what is included and how it will be manifested, but you should find yourself able to express some very complex ideas through the different kinds of headings.

Headings for literature: language, period, and form

The examples at the beginning of this chapter demonstrate a degree of precoordination, which is a general characteristic of the headings for creative subjects, and this is certainly the case for literature. There is fairly comprehensive coverage of languages and forms in combination (e.g. Swedish fiction, Urdu drama) using headings of this general form.